


Road Trip

by occasionalphantomfiction (SemiRetiredAuthor)



Series: Phanniemay 2016 [3]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Danny/Sam is assumed but not discussed, Friendship, Gen, Phanniemay, Phanniemay 2016, Phanniemay16, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-27 00:27:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12569580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SemiRetiredAuthor/pseuds/occasionalphantomfiction
Summary: Danny had been on a few road trips in his life, but they’d all been with his family and thus came with a little family drama and a lack of the kind of excitement he always saw in the movies when friends traveled together.





	Road Trip

**Author's Note:**

> This is just slightly AU to fit the plot I wanted. Explanation: In Reality Trip, Danny sets everything back to the way it was before Freakshow did anything at all with the reality gauntlet. I think Danny wouldn’t have just known how to use the gauntlet perfectly with no prior experience, so he would’ve just turned back time to the start of summer break and dealt with Sam and Tucker forgetting.

Danny had been on a few road trips in his life, but they’d all been with his family and thus came with a little family drama and a lack of the kind of excitement he always saw in the movies when friends traveled together. That, and the one time when he and his friends had dealt with the reality gauntlet… but he didn’t really count that trip considering that he was the only one who truly remembered the event after he’d saved the day. Sure, he’d told Sam and Tucker about it after they forgot, but it wasn’t really the same when he knew they couldn’t remember actually taking a road trip like he could.

Now that he thought about it, if he ignored that time, he hadn’t been on any sort of trip in years. Of course, it would be rather difficult to go anywhere now that he was Amity Park’s main defense against ghost invasions, and really it was lucky that his parents hadn’t tried to take them on a family road trip since he’d gotten his powers…still, it was something he occasionally fantasized about.

That was what led him to jump on his first opportunity for a road trip. Okay, maybe it wasn’t a road trip in the common sense of the word, but he could live with a close substitution. Sam had mentioned one day shortly after she’d gotten her driver’s license that she wanted to make a trip to a mall in a bordering state to visit a one-of-a-kind clothing store for goths. Danny recognized the opportunity for what it was and became the trip’s main organizer despite it initially being planned as a quick solo trip only for Sam’s benefit.

Danny wanted to make sure everyone had a good time, so good that they’d have enough great memories to completely make up for that forgotten trip. His first order of business was coming up with an itinerary. Sam and Tucker at first saw this as completely unnecessary, but Danny quickly won over Tucker by finding some sort of tech shop only a few miles away from Sam’s destination. Even when he’d mentioned it, Danny wasn’t sure what was so great about that particular store for Tucker, but he wasn’t going to question anything that made his friends more interested in this road trip. From there, he found a restaurant that was supposedly “the home of the best deep dish pizza in the state,” which was a promising place for them to have a late lunch before they returned to Amity Park. He’d yet to find a destination for himself to check out during the trip, but that was less important than being sure Sam and Tucker were fully convinced at the time.

Sam, ever the voice of reason, continued to remind him that he had chosen to be responsible for the town’s safety and that his absence wasn’t at all likely to go unnoticed. Ghosts did always seem to attack when it was least convenient, and having Amity Park’s hero an entire state’s distance away was a particularly inconvenient time for a ghost attack. He did spend a fair bit of time struggling with what was honestly a good argument against the road trip…but desperate times called for desperate measures, and so he let himself consider even the most ridiculous of measures, trying to come up with one that could work, just for a single day. One day was all he needed.

That was what led him to recruit Dora and Johnny 13. Dora, for one, wasn’t too crazy an idea. She’d proven her trustworthiness plenty of times by now, showing Danny that she wasn’t interested in the kinds of cruel and annoying behaviors that most of the other ghosts were. Johnny…well, he was more of a risk, more of a crazy idea, but Danny had figured this would be worth the risk. The plan was for Dora to spend the day guarding the Fenton portal, frightening away any ghost that might try to escape by using her admittedly terrifying dragon form. In return, Danny would help her gather enough ghosts to throw one of the balls she was so fanatical about. After all, he interacted with a lot more of the ghosts outside of her kingdom than she did, so the friendlier ones might actually listen if he invited them to the event. As for Johnny 13, Danny had decided he’d need a backup measure. If Dora couldn’t manage to stop every ghost from escaping the Fenton portal or if some ghosts escaped from an unguarded natural portal, Johnny’s job was to send them back to the ghost zone. Johnny’s shadow certainly caused enough trouble for Danny on the occasions when the two weren’t on the same side, so he hoped that the shadow would be able to harm or annoy the escaped ghosts to the point of returning to the ghost zone. Johnny had been particularly easy to convince to take the job with a little… missing information. Danny had extended the offer without mentioning that he would be completely indisposed and unable to fight the ghosts on that day. Instead, he’d claimed he wanted a day off to enjoy himself. Not technically a lie, but certainly not the whole truth. Since Johnny believed Danny would be somewhere nearby to stop him from leaving the ghost zone even during the day off, Danny’s offer of allowing Johnny and Kitty to peacefully spend time in Amity Park for the entire day seemed like a fair price for the work.

Surprisingly, Sam finally stopped trying to convince him not to turn her event into a road trip after hearing his plan. He couldn’t be completely sure why, but his best guess was that she’d realized he’d do pretty much anything to make this road trip work. Either that, or she had more faith in Johnny and Kitty than he did. Without Sam’s resistance, planning became much easier. Tucker was finally just as excited as Danny, and maybe Sam wasn’t as enthusiastic as he would have liked, but her newfound tolerance was better than the obstinate refusal from before.

It was Wednesday, and they’d finally agreed that they’d head on their trip on the coming Saturday. They’d come up with their five major stops, and Danny was in full agreement when Tucker suggested they also leave enough free time to be able to stop anywhere unplanned that looked interesting. As far as the locations they were sure they’d be visiting, they’d scheduled Sam’s gothic shop, Tucker’s tech store, and the pizza place Danny had found earlier, as well as a thrift store whose website promised it specialized in video games and an old-fashioned ice cream joint roughly halfway between Amity Park and their destination that would offer a perfect break from the drive home. Danny had had a small bag packed for the trip since he’d first had the idea, and he checked it yet again that night to make sure he had everything for the perfect road trip.

Saturday arrived after what had felt like an eternity to Danny, and he was beyond excited. Even the failed test Mr. Lancer had handed back to him the day before could hardly touch his excitement; he’d been careful to avoid mentioning that F to his parents just yet in case his parents decided to ground him when they found out. They three had agreed to meet at Sam’s house that morning, so Danny was quick to grab his bag and begin his flight to the Manson residence. He phased into Sam’s car to prepare for the start of the trip and to drop off his bag before moving on to greet her and then wait together in her living room for Tucker to show up. Luckily, he didn’t take long.

The two passengers delayed their start by a couple of minutes with a small argument over who would have to take the backseat, but Sam was soon fed up with the fight and made the decision for them.

“Tucker, you’re in front. I only got my license last month, so I’m not even allowed to have two people in the car with me. Danny, if you’re in the back, you can just go invisible if I get pulled over. It would look a little weird if any police officer saw me driving around with no one in the passenger seat and Tucker in the back.” The reasoning was sound, so Danny climbed into the backseat without further complaint. He caught Tucker’s gaze in the rear view mirror and grinned just as Sam turned her key in the ignition and Dumpty Humpty blasted into the car. Sam knew her car had been locked and immediately glared at the obvious perpetrator as she turned Danny’s choice of road trip music down to a more bearable level.

“Very funny, Danny.” He might have felt a little bad for annoying her, but only if he hadn’t seen the smile she was desperately trying to hide from him while she still glared. She pulled out of her driveway, and there were no further incidents until she had just turned onto the first highway of their journey.

“I’m hunnnnnnnnnngry,” Tucker groaned, interrupting the group’s gossiping about their classmates.

“No way! We did _not_ agree that I would have to stop for food this early,” Sam complained. “We’re already stopping to eat at two different places. Why didn’t you eat before you came over?”

“But I woke up late, and you would’ve been madder if I’d stopped to eat breakfast!” tucker defended himself.

“Uh, I could go for something to eat too,” Danny added, more out of solidarity for his friend than out of actual hunger.

“Fiiiiiine,” Sam conceded. “But just wait until you guys get your licenses and are driving _me_ around. I _will_ remember this, and I will make every minute on the road a living hell for you.”

Tucker was too distracted by the thought of food to consider the threat and simply cheered. Meanwhile, Danny laughed at her threat, still ninety percent certain he’d never bother getting his driver’s license. Who needs to drive when you have ghost powers?

Sam found a Nasty Burger after a few more miles, and she pulled off of the highway and into the parking lot. The music abruptly stopped as she turned her key. Danny looked at her quizzically.

“What? I’m hungry too. I guess we all skipped breakfast, huh?” Danny laughed with Sam as the trio headed into the building and made their orders. They resumed their gossip session as they sat down and ate their food.

The three left the building in much better moods, and they set off on their road trip once more, chattering about their favorite destinations and getting distracted by tangents into other topics. Occasionally, Tucker or Danny would see something amusing from their windows and would point it out to the group. Most of the morning passed like this.

It was just before noon when they reached their first stop: Sam’s clothes store. Danny had rarely seen the goth so happy as she was while she pawed through the variety of unique outfits and accessories. Danny hadn’t expected to have much fun at their first stop, but it was surprisingly entertaining to watch Sam’s reactions to everything. The store was clearly at least as amazing as she’d thought it would be. Eventually, he and Tucker moved to the front of the store to stay out of the shoppers’ way and wait for their friend.

As Sam checked out, Tucker was getting more and more excited, knowing his stop was next. It took only a few minutes of driving to reach the store, and Tucker ran in ahead of the other two, trying to take in as much of the store as he could at once. Danny and Sam followed, laughing at their friend’s obvious excitement. Danny didn’t find the same level of cuteness to Tucker’s nerd-out as he did to Sam’s, but he was amused nevertheless. Danny and Sam spent most of their time looking at the store’s gaming computers, which were probably the only items in the whole shop that either of them would ever use.

Tucker loved the whole shop, but he didn’t take quite as much time as Sam had, knowing he could only afford a few of his favorite devices. Soon, they’d made their way back to Sam’s car, the trunk already impressively full of shopping bags. They’d planned on going to Danny’s stop next, but now that they were here, they all agreed that they’d rather stop for the pizza first since it had been hours since the Nasty Burger detour.

Danny considered the pizzas as they ate—a small mushroom and onion pizza for Sam and a large pepperoni pizza for Danny and Tucker to split. It wasn’t that it was bad pizza, but he had a hard time believing that _this_ was the best deep dish pizza in the entire state. Shrugging the issue off, he stood up with his friends to pay for the food and leave the restaurant.

Danny thought the thrift shop was even better than it had sounded online. He’d chosen it in the hopes that all of them could enjoy it, and he was pleased to see he was right. The three stuck together as they looked at their favorite genres and then split up once they weren’t interested in the genres the others wanted to move on to. Danny ended up finding a few new games to try out when he had some free time, and Sam and Tucker picked up some games too.

Danny sighed as he moved once more into the back seat. They’d been in the city for almost three hours now, and he could feel the exhaustion that came from waking up early on a Saturday now.

Although the three had agreed to stop anywhere that looked interesting, they’d actually found that they’d already worked everything interesting into their trip. They’d seen a few other places they might have stopped, but with Danny’s and Tucker’s enthusiasm slowly dying due to sleepiness, they’d all stopped long enough to realize that each of the spots they’d pointed out was pretty similar to some shop or another in Amity Park. With that final conclusion, Sam suggested they begin the drive home.

As they approached the ice cream joint, Sam warned the other two that they were close. With no response, she glanced quickly to the passenger and back seats only to find both of her friends fast asleep. _Oh well_ , she thought. _I didn’t really want ice cream that much anyway._ She continued the drive toward Amity Park so she could get her sleepy friends to bed.

Danny woke up only a few minutes too late to ask Sam to stop for ice cream. He thought about how much fun they’d had throughout the day and smiled as he closed his eyes and drifted back into another nap. It had been a perfect road trip.


End file.
